There's no sign that Koei ever intends to bring its Romance of the Three Kingdoms DS titles stateside -- likely because you didn't buy Opoona -- but it looks like the company will celebrate its 30th anniversary by releasing Romance Of The Three Kingdoms DS 2 in Korea.
Though we're a little upset that we still haven't received the year-old turn-based-strategy game, what really grinds our gears is that Koei is throwing in a themed Nintendo DS Lite hard case with preorders. Where's our preorder incentives, Koei? Just because we don't pirate everything under the sun doesn't mean that we don't deserve to decorate our handhelds with third-century Chinese historical figures?
Gallery: Romance of the Three Kingdoms DS 2
The new Romance of the Three Kingdoms game has online play, and that's ... pretty cool, if you can play Romance of the Three Kingdoms games. Which we can't, at all. We're plenty educated, and well-versed in gaming, and we can't figure that mess out. Looking at that screen full of tiny icons and numbers makes us appreciate the simple button-mashing found in the Dynasty Warriors spinoff series. The screens here apparently show different commands and combat situations, but it's all just tiny stuff and numbers and very serious portraits of Chinese historical figures.
At first, when we saw these shots, we were confused and even a little alarmed. Hadn't this game already come out in Japan, or had we hallucinated the entire thing? Was it pushed back over a year? What happened? Then we remembered that it's a Romance of the Three Kingdoms title, which is probably why the screenshots for the sequel look almost exactly like the screenshots from the first game for the DS. It all makes sense now.
Just when you thought everything had been done with Romance of the Three Kingdoms .... Sangokushi Taisen DS brings elements of the Chinese historical novel to card-based battle action, which is apparently a match made in heaven from the success the arcade version has enjoyed in Japan. The DS game, which is slated to have WiFi multiplayer functionality, is due out in Japan next month. Dates for other regions have yet to be announced, which makes us sad after seeing some of the lush screens. The rest of us need to throw down with vast armies, too!
It's always good to see an RPG still going strong despite the dominance of household games like Final Fantasy and Suikoden -- just to name a few.
